Without Registers, Public On-Line Services Will Only Be Half-Operational

Departments will have to agree on rules for mutual data exchange
[9.3.2005, TREND / Jozef Andacký, Konštantín Čikovský, Martin Valášek and Peter Marčan]

Nine and twenty-six: this the number of application forms and compulsory annexes via which the department of the environment communicates with the business sector at present. Fourteen and six: this number of different forms also applies to registering motor vehicles.
These are only two examples from the audit by the consulting company S&K Management Systems which confirm that dealing with official affairs is not an activity which anyone could describe as simple and non-problematic. Citizens and businessmen have to fill in the same information over and over again. And they attach documents which other state institutions issued them with, or else attach records from official databases.
The answer to the question of how to considerably simplify communication with the state administration presents itself immediately; government computer technicians know it well. Data that has been collected once should be able to be used for another official act. It would be ideal if the whole process could be done in one place, on a central official website.
However, in order to do this, the databases administered by the state must be linked together. Three of them provide twenty online services which the state has selected as key services based on the recommendations of the eEurope Plus programme: the trades register, the real estate register and the population register. As long as they are not ready for the environment of electronic government, public online services will only be half-operational.
Population Register
Even though the trades and real estate register have already laid the foundations for mutual communication, one-stop-shopping in public administration is still far in the distance; the population register requires the most work. Unlike the other state databases, it cannot for the moment provide access to the data it contains. “The real estate and trades register are one step ahead,” admits the head of the section of personal records and documents of the Ministry of the Interior SR, Anton Dubčák.
However, in his opinion, the department supports the idea of integrating state databases into a portal. In the long range, he even considers that the population register could work pro-actively. “If any data in it changes, for example, an address of permanent residence, the computer system initiates a change in the other basic registries of public administration”, explains Dubčák. Citizens and businessmen would therefore not have to declare each change separately.
Rules for cooperation
The cooperation between registers must follow certain rules. The most important are the standards/ formats in which the data will be exchanged and made accessible. As long as the parliament approves the law on computer systems in public administration prepared by the Ministry of Transport, the standards will be created by a commission established by the plenipotentiary of the government for computerisation. The database operators want to take part in creating the standards.
“If a standard was defined which was too different from that used at present, we would have to transcribe the data and modify it,” affirms A. Dubčák; and this would complicate, slow down and make the whole process more expensive in his opinion.
However, before dealing with standards, the Ministry of the Interior must connect the population register to institutions which ensure the input of information: registry offices and residence declaration points. “It seems that it would be enough to connect two or three hundred towns and villages to deal with a major part of the input,” states A. Dubčák.
At present, data enters the register via the district police headquarters, and in very archaic manner at that: by copying by hand from paper forms into the computer system. “This is another, and not just potential, generator of mistakes in input,” suggests A. Dubčák. If one employee writes down surnames, for example, all in upper case, and another uses lower case too, or else adds a space between letters, this can confuse the system.

“If a standard was defined which was too different from that used at present, we would have to transcribe the data and modify it,” affirms A. Dubčák; and this would complicate, slow down and make the whole process more expensive in his opinion.However, before dealing with standards, the Ministry of the Interior must connect the population register to institutions which ensure the input of information: registry offices and residence declaration points. “It seems that it would be enough to connect two or three hundred towns and villages to deal with a major part of the input,” states A. Dubčák. At present, data enters the register via the district police headquarters, and in very archaic manner at that: by copying by hand from paper forms into the computer system. “This is another, and not just potential, generator of mistakes in input,” suggests A. Dubčák. If one employee writes down surnames, for example, all in upper case, and another uses lower case too, or else adds a space between letters, this can confuse the system.

They want people and money

Employees of the Office of Geodesy, Cartography and Real Estate also talk about the high error rate of their register. In their opinion, this is one of the reasons why the real estate portal should not be accessible without payment of a fee. Mistakes present in the electronic real estate register should be removed “manually” according to them. In answer to the question of who will do it and when, they reply that they need people and money for this, and none of these are going spare in their department.Each register should have its data made accessible not only via a central portal, but also on its own Internet site. The trades register, as well as the less-known tradesmen’s register, has already had its own website for a few years, and the real estate register joined in one year ago. However, while the first two can be consulted free of charge, an extract from the real estate register must be paid for.